


anything to make you smile

by starlight_sugar



Series: The General Specific [1]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Professors, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-29
Updated: 2015-10-29
Packaged: 2018-04-28 17:23:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5099027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starlight_sugar/pseuds/starlight_sugar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Here’s the thing about flirting: Jon’s not great at it. He’s still not sure how much of what Miles is doing is actually flirting and how much his him wishing it’s flirting.</p><p>(Or: Professor Risinger might have a crush on Dr. Luna. It's a serious problem.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	anything to make you smile

**Author's Note:**

> Because I can't believe Jon was actually a professor. Thanks to [Tam](http://mysblink.tumblr.com) for turning me on to this ship. Title comes from [No One's Gonna Love You](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuZo7pLnL7c) by Band of Horses.
> 
> Rooster Teeth does not have my permission to use any portion of my writing in your video content.

“The cool thing about typography is that it gets an impression across to your audience without them actually knowing the tone of your project.” Jon settles back against his desk and looks up at the lecture hall. Most of the students actually look interested. That’s a good sign. If they’re not sick of him halfway through the semester, they’re going to be just fine.

He clicks his remote, and the projector changes slides to a mock-up movie poster - nothing fancy, fifteen minutes’ work in Photoshop, with the title across the bottom in Helvetica. “Imagine you walk into a movie theater and see this poster. What’s your first thought going to be?”

“Low-budget,” someone yells from the back of the classroom. The rest of the students erupt into nervous giggles, like they’re not sure if they should be laughing.

Jon smiles wryly. “You’re not far off, actually. If nothing else, you’re thinking, ‘They got a bad poster designer,’ right? Or maybe ‘this looks like a twelve-year-old made it.’ This font doesn’t tell you anything about the movie. Now, let’s say you see this same poster, but now it looks like this.” He clicks the button, and the font on the poster changes to a sprawling cursive. “What are you thinking?”

“Romance?” a boy offers from the front row.

“Maybe it’s a period drama,” the girl next to him adds.

“Spot on.” Jon grins. “What if I did this?” He clicks the button, and the font goes from white to pale pink.

“Definitely a romance now,” the same boy says.

Jon nods. “Good, you’re getting the hang of it. The thing is, nowadays, people can make their own fonts based on their handwriting, or use any font that already exists. The sky’s the limit.” He clicks the button, and at the same time, he hears the door to the classroom creak open. He pointedly shifts so his back is towards the door and points at the screen, now with a dozen copies of the movie poster with a dozen different fonts.

“Those all look like they could be for different movies,” a student remarks.

“Exactly right. When you’re picking a font for a project, you have to constantly be questioning what the font is going to mean to your audience.” Jon gestures at the screen and intentionally takes a couple of slow, swaggering steps towards it.

“What, like how different fonts have different meanings?” someone says.

Jon still doesn’t turn around. “Even more than that. You have to ask what the font size will mean. You have to ask what the width of the letters will mean. You have to ask what the shading of the letters will mean, and most importantly-” he turns on his heel, and Miles freezes mid-step. “You have to ask if Dr. Luna will ever learn to stop trying to sneak up on me while I’m teaching.”

“Oh my god,” Miles says as the students erupt into laughter. Jon smirks at him, and Miles shakes his head in amazement. “How do you do that every time?”

“I have eyes in the back of my head,” Jon says, and the students quiet themselves into giggles. He can feel them all watching him, trying to determine what his next move will be. “Dr. Luna, why don’t you want my students to learn about typography?”

“It’s not that I don’t want them to.” Miles shrugs. “It’s that I put my own entertainment above their education.”

Jon does not roll his eyes, because he needs his students to respect him, but he sighs as dramatically as he dares. “Luckily for you, their class today is going to end early. I’m sure they’ll all check their syllabus and submit their design projects to me by midnight, isn’t that right?”

“Yes, Professor Risinger,” a few of them chorus as the rest shove their things into their bags and stampede out.

Jon gives them a thumbs-up before giving his attention to Miles, who’s started bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Can I help you?”

Miles flings himself into the chair behind Jon’s desk. “My office is boring.”

“Go bother Josh.”

“He’s knee-deep in ungraded essays.”

“Then bother Kerry.”

“This classroom was closer than his.”

“Do some goddamn work?” Jon turns to unplug his laptop from the projector and pack his own things up. The classroom is empty, which is a blessing; he loves his students, but he’d rather talk with Miles while he can.

“Grad students keep asking for help on their theses like they think I can tell them what to do.”

“That doesn’t sound boring.”

“They think I’m responsible,” Miles whines. “They think I know what I’m doing.”

“Don’t you?”

“Oh, God, no.” Miles sounds so sure of it, too, and Jon does roll his eyes this time. For all that Miles complains, he’s a genuinely gifted writer, and their English department is lucky to have him. Of course Miles knows what he’s doing; Jon wouldn’t like him if he didn’t.

Instead of saying any of that, Jon slips his laptop into his bag and turns around. “Want to grab lunch before you’re swamped with students?”

Miles grins, grabs Jon by the wrist, and starts towards the door. “I thought you’d never ask.”

.

Chris taps a pen on his chin. “What makes you think he’s flirting?”

“I’m not sure it’s flirting yet, we can’t assume it is.”

“Okay, but you’re telling me about it, which means you feel pretty strongly, right?”

“I guess,” Jon admits. Chris is right; he wouldn’t say anything if he weren’t at least a little sure.

“Then what makes you think so?”

Jon sighs. “He interrupts my classes once a week to try and sneak up behind me and mess around. Never the same class twice in a row, but all my classes have seen it.” They’re all impressed that Jon can tell where Miles is without looking, too; Jon doesn’t ruin the illusion by explaining that it took two years to perfect. “And then we go out for lunch.”

“I go out for lunch with my coworkers, too.”

“He pays. Every time.”

Chris’s pen clatters to the floor. “Every time?”

“Four times out of five,” Jon amends. He won’t always let Miles pay, he’s not that much of a douchebag. He clicks on the newest student-submitted photo and tries not to groan. “My students are learning nothing.”

“Well, if their classes keep getting interrupted, it could be detrimental. I mean…”

Jon glances over; Chris is doing something with his eyebrows that’s probably meant to be significant and meaningful. Jon has never wanted a new roommate more than he does in that moment. “What?”

“You could always tell him to stop.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because he keeps interrupting your classes?”

Jon snorts. “Chris, my wallet’s gotten a lot fatter since he started taking me out to lunch.”

“Yeah,” Chris says, and goes back to whatever script he’s editing. “That’s why you let him do it. Not because you think it’s flirting.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Jon says, and clicks on the next photo. “Jesus, clearly we need to go over color theory again, these are atrocious.”

“You do that,” Chris says, propping his feet on the coffee table. Jon sighs and opens up his syllabus to see when they can fit in a review.

.

The way Jon recalls it, the first time he met Miles went like this:

Two years ago in August, at Burnie’s pre-semester faculty party, Miles decided to introduce himself to a new professor by sneaking up behind him, clapping both hands on his shoulders, and shouting “Boo!” at the top of his lungs. Jon had, in his opinion, reacted perfectly reasonably when he spun around and slapped Miles as hard as he could.

All told, it was not the best first meeting.

The most important part of the meeting came after Burnie had finished laughing at them and and they’d learned each other’s names. Miles was somewhere between sullen and sheepish, and he was looking at Jon with a strange kind of curiosity. Jon was just glad his heart had stopped racing.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” Miles said, which wasn’t quite an apology. “Nobody’s ever slapped me for that before.”

“Then I’m glad did,” Jon said sourly. “And my hand hurts now.”

“Your hand,” Miles scoffed. “My face!”

“Your face deserved it.”

“You’re making a great first impression, new guy,” Miles said, but he sounded like he actually meant it. “What are you teaching anyways?”

“Graphic design. Only intro-level courses now.” Jon shrugged. “What about you?”

“Writing and literary analysis, all that good stuff.”

Jon looked Miles up and down and nodded. “You seem like a writer.”

Miles made an affronted noise. “Don’t insult me like that, Jon, we only just met.”

“I don’t understand you,” Jon told him.

Miles just grinned, looking positively gleeful. “You and I are going to be great friends, Jon.”

To this day, Jon’s not sure if that was a prediction or a statement of intent. It’s not like it matters; he was right either way.

.

“Invite Miles over for dinner,” Chris says out of the blue, a handful of days after Jon finally admitted that Miles was flirting.

(Here’s the thing about flirting: Jon’s not great at it. He’s still not sure how much of what Miles is doing is actually flirting and how much his him wishing it’s flirting. He can’t help it if he wants Miles to be flirting, all right, he’s only human. Miles is what would happen if someone injected sunlight into a puppy and turned that puppy into a sarcastic human genius. He’s more than a little enamored at this point.)

“Absolutely not,” Jon says, and that’s supposed to be the end of it, except-

“Oops, I think I phrased that wrong,” Chris says, so faux-innocent that Jon immediately turns to look at him. Chris is giving him a guileless, wide-eyed look. “I actually meant that I talked to Kerry, got his number, and he’s coming over for dinner tomorrow night.”

There’s a minute where Jon can’t respond to that. His brain cannot come up with a way to answer that statement, and he’s stuck gaping at Chris like a fish.

“You’re welcome,” Chris says smugly.

“I hate you,” Jon manages with feeling. “I hate you so fucking much, you-”

“I’m sacrificing a night of working so you can flirt awkwardly with the guy you’ve been complaining about since you met him.” Chris raises his eyebrows. “And you hate me?”

“Yes,” Jon mutters. “I guess I’m cooking.”

Chris claps him on the shoulder. “You had better believe you’re cooking.”

.

“Jon!” Kerry calls, and Jon bites back a sigh. Class is starting, or really about to start, and he really needs to be inside the classroom in order to start class. It’s apparently not enough that Josh held him back to talk about needing a design student for some script project, now Kerry is going to make him late.

“Kerry, can it wait?” he says, but turns to face him anyways. “I’ve got to remind freshmen how the rainbow works.”

“That sounds delightful,” Kerry says flatly. “No, I just wanted to say… what’s up?”

Jon stares at him. Kerry stares back. Jon has the distinct feeling that he’s missing a piece of this particular puzzle. “What’s up,” he repeats.

“Yeah, you know, what’s going on,” Kerry says determinedly.

“Kerry, I don’t-”

“In your life, Jon. What’s occurring right now?”

“My class needs their professor.”

“And I need an answer.”

“You are full of _shit_ ,” Jon answers, and he goes into his lecture hall, where Miles is standing in front of all of his students, talking in a low voice. Jon pauses and closes the door as quietly as he can, trying to figure out what Miles could possibly be doing.

“Hi, Professor Risinger,” someone says very loudly.

Miles jumps and turns to face Jon, pasting on a wide grin. “Jon! You’ve got great kids in here. Kids are the future, man, they’re-”

“Miles,” Jon sighs, trying to sound as long-suffering as he can. “What are you doing?”

“I was proposing a collaborative project with your students.”

“What is the project?”

“It’s a secret!” Miles turns back to face the students. “So remember, if you want to help me out, let me know as quickly as possible so I know what I’m working with here. Just shoot me an email as soon as you’re done listening to your brilliant, beautiful professor.”

Jon shakes his head. “Get out,” he says, and he can’t even deny that he sounds ridiculously fond. He kind of hates that, actually.

Miles bounds over to the door and clasps Jon’s shoulder. “See you at lunch, all right?”

“Go,” he says, and Miles goes, and a couple of students giggle. “Seriously, what was he talking about?”

“It was a secret, Professor Risinger,” one student says, the picture of nonchalance. “It’s nothing illegal, we promise.”

“He’s smart enough not to do something illegal.” Jon glances over his shoulder; he can hear Miles and Kerry talking outside in hushed voices. “He’s going to tell me, right?”

None of the students answer, and Jon sighs. “All right, let’s get started with classes.”

.

Jon means to grill him about it at lunch, he really does, but Miles takes him to a hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop and orders for both of them before Jon can say a word. And then they sit down, and he means to do it then, but Miles is smart enough to know he’s planning on it, because the first thing he says is, “Your roommate might be stalking me.”

And, Jon remembers with a start, Miles is coming over for dinner. Tonight. That might be a little more important than whatever mystery secret Miles has going on.

“You don’t have to come if you don’t want,” he says immediately. “I mean - God, that came out wrong, it’s not that I don’t want you to come over, it’s that you shouldn’t feel obligated to come just because Chris is a fucking whacko.”

“Whacko?” Miles repeats amusedly. “You call people whackos?”

Jon drops his head into his hands. “I don’t know, I’m still not sure why he invited you.”

“Well, he and Kerry are friends, right?”

“Yeah, they worked on some short film together or something. Chris writes.”

Miles’s mouth forms a perfect O. Jon realizes belatedly that this may not have been the best thing to say. It may have actually been the worst.

“I swear that I’m not trying to keep my roommate a secret from you,” he says quickly. “We’re only living together because, like - between the two of us we can afford a decent apartment, but he’s a goddamn maniac-”

“Because he’s a writer,” Miles says delightedly. “Oh, I am definitely coming over, and I can talk to him about how you collect writers as friends.”

“I do not collect writers.”

“Me, him, Josh… Kerry writes sometimes…”

Jon sighs. “It’s not intentional.”

Miles pats him on the shoulder as the waiter approaches their table with sandwiches. “You’ve just got a subconscious thing. No shame, buddy. No shame.”

The sandwich is delicious. Jon knows he shouldn’t be angry about that, but he still somehow is.

.

Jon hasn’t been on a date in-

Okay. Stop. Rewind.

Jon’s last date was over a year ago and he didn’t realize it was supposed to be a date until the guy went in for a kiss at the end of the night. He thought it was a casual night out with a friend. There’s really no good way to bounce back from that.

Jon’s last intentional date was… a while before that.

He’s not sure if this counts as a date, especially if Chris is going to be there, but he’s cooking dinner for the guy he has a ridiculous high school-esque crush on. He spent five minutes trying to decide if he should change his shirt or if that’s too much preparation for a not-a-date. He even tried to throw things around so the apartment looked a little less like two people with no time to clean lived in it.

Chris spent the whole time laughing at him. Jon could not blame him if he tried.

Jon might be going a little stir-crazy, which is why he forces himself to keep dinner simple. Lasagna is simple. Lasagna is easy to put together, and everyone likes it, and they’re going to have leftovers, and it’s a win-win situation that has nothing to do with Miles mentioning once, offhand, several months ago, that he likes lasagna. That part is so embarrassing that he won’t even tell Chris. Chris would find a way to use it as ammunition one day.

But the point is, Jon hasn’t been on a date in a while, which means he can be forgiven for being nervous. He’s a little worried just because he’s not even sure if it’s a date. In fact, he’s pretty sure it’s not, but he still has pre-date jitters. He hates that.

Miles knocks on the door at seven on the dot, and Jon immediately makes himself scarce.

“You’re a wimp,” Chris says. “A wimp, Risinger.”

“You’re the one who invited him over,” Jon calls, going into the kitchen. “You get to answer the door.”

“And what are you doing?”

“I’m making a salad so we can pretend we’re healthy.”

Chris laughs and pulls the door open. The first thing he says is “God, you’re taller than I expected.”

“I get that a lot,” Miles says, a laugh in his voice. “So you’re the roommate, right? I’m Miles.”

“Chris. Come on in, Jon’s hiding-”

“Cooking!” Jon calls as he digs through the fridge, because he will _not_ allow Chris to make a fool of him in their own home.

“Hiding by making food,” Chris corrects.

“Hi, Jon! I brought flowers,” Miles says cheerfully.

Jon almost drops the bag of salad. “You brought _flowers_?”

“You have a lovely home,” Miles says, overly sincere. Jon looks up, and he is in fact holding a bundle of fucking sunflowers, Christ alive. “Isn’t that normal, bringing a gift when someone invites you over?”

“Would you bring a gift to Kerry?”

“I am a gift to Kerry.” Miles catches his eye and grins. “And to you, but I figured, if you’re feeding me I should bring something.”

Jon glances at Chris. “Do we own a vase?”

“Yeah, actually, remember, that time Barb got us-”

“The flowers that you were allergic to.” Jon snaps his fingers. “Right. So we can put those in-”

“Wait, hold on.” Chris’s brow furrows, and he goes digging in his pocket for his phone. He taps the screen and swears under his breath, and Jon can feel his stomach sinking.

“Everything all right?” Miles asks, setting the flowers down on the counter.

Chris sighs. “Shit, I hate to do this, but I have to go.”

“Go,” Jon repeats, trying not to sound too overtly doubtful.

“Aaron says there’s some kind of production problem in the studio. I don’t know what he means, but-” Chris looks at Miles, that wide-eyed innocent look back on his face, and Jon hates him, he really does. “I hate to bail on you, I know I was the one who invited you over.”

“No, it’s fine!” Miles says hurriedly. “God, don’t apologize, go do your work.”

“But Jon made lasagna,” Chris says, and he actually does sound disappointed.

Miles stares at Jon in awe. “You made lasagna?”

“Yeah, and his lasagna is amazing.” Chris throws Jon a cheesy wink, like he doesn’t realize that he’s being the worst wingman ever by leaving.

Jon waves at him tiredly. “Go. There’ll be leftovers. Tell everyone that their timing sucks.”

“They already know.” Chris hurries to the door and slips on a pair of shoes. “Miles, you’ll have to come over another time so we can talk about writing shit.”

“Yeah, any time,” Miles says, but he’s still looking at Jon.

Jon swallows and glances at Chris. “Let me know when you’re on your way back.”

And Chris, being an absolute bastard, gives Jon the most shit-eating grin he possibly can. “Have fun, you two,” he practically chirps, and then he’s out the door.

Jon turns back to Miles, and he thinks if it wasn’t a date before, it’s bordering on being one now. “So, uh-”

“I can leave if you want,” Miles says out of nowhere.

“No!” Jon yelps, and he can feel himself turning scarlet as Miles very slowly raises his eyebrows. “I mean - I already made dinner, you’re already here, you’re welcome to stay if you want.”

“Only if answer one question.”

“Shoot.”

Miles leans in conspiratorially. “Is he always that bad of a liar?”

Jon barks out a laugh. “Absolutely. He’s a decent actor, but he can’t lie for shit.”

“So that wasn’t really a work emergency?”

“Of course not.” Jon sets the bag of salad on the counter behind him. “He’s just being a dick.”

“By bailing on a dinner he set up?”

 _No_ , Jon thinks, _by trying to set me up on a date_. “Yeah, exactly,” he says aloud.

“What an asshole,” Miles says, but he leans to look around Jon’s shoulder. “Lasagna?”

“Yeah, make yourself at home. We’ve got a TV, you can put on something you like.”

“What if I like Halo?”

“Then I’ll kick your ass at Halo while we eat.”

Miles grins, eyes bright. “Oh, it’s on. I’ll have you know that I’m fucking incredible at Halo. 

. 

Here are some things Jon did not know about Miles Luna:

1\. He makes borderline orgasmic noises while eating lasagna. (Some of this may be an act or a way of flirting. Jon doesn’t know. Jon doesn’t care. He never wants to hear those noises again. Or every night. Either one of those works.)

2\. He refuses to eat the salad. (Jon’s not sure if it’s on principle or because he ate so much goddamn lasagna.)

3\. He’s actually not bad at Halo. (Jon is better.)

4\. He will stop at nothing to stop Jon from winning. (This includes sitting on him and attempting to steal his lasagna off his plate. Nothing works.)

In fact, Miles is sitting on Jon’s lap and shouting something unintelligible when Jon’s phone begins chirping. Jon wouldn’t notice, except Miles’s shouting begins to become more intelligible, and it includes the words “and you don’t even notice your fucking phone going off.”

“Shit, wait, what?” Jon pauses the game, ignoring Miles whining in protest, and reaches for his phone. He has not one, not two, but four emails from students, and they don’t even owe him projects today. He’s pretty sure that’s never happened before. “Hang on, I need to look at these.

“What are they?”

“Emails from students.”

“Oh,” Miles says, and he shifts off Jon’s lap to crash onto the couch. “Yeah, those might be important, you should do that. You could use a break from this ass-kicking anyways.”

Jon scoffs, but he’s distracted by his inbox. The emails are from four different students, and each subject line is numbered one through four. He tilts his phone screen towards Miles. “Look at this.”

“Huh,” Miles answers, voice forcedly casual. “Maybe you should read them in order.”

“Maybe, yeah.” Jon clicks on the first one. There’s no text, only a banner (decent design, actually, and Jon can feel a spark of pride) that reads “roses are red.” The second one is the same, except the banner says “violets are blue.”

“I think my students are flirting with me,” he tells Miles.

“I wonder what the other half of the poem is,” Miles says, voice falling just flat of natural, and Jon frowns at him before opening the third one.

The banner in this one says “Dr. Luna wants to know,” and Jon’s blood freezes in his veins. There’s no way this is a coincidence - whatever this is, Miles knows about it, probably thought of it, and he needed to get the students in on it somehow.

Which reminds him: Miles was talking to his students.

“Miles,” Jon says, but he’s already clicking on the fourth email. “What were you doing in my class this morning?”

“Um,” Miles answers nervously. “Commandeering your creative forces?”

“Oh my god,” Jon mutters, his heart in his throat as the last banner loads. This one is simple, understated, very tasteful, and it reads “if you like him too.” He stares at it for a solid minute, swallowing hard, trying to understand.

Miles clears his throat loudly. “So I borrowed some of your students. I’m not sure how they did, I haven’t seen them, they were all going to work on them together so they matched.”

He sounds subdued, and Jon looks over at him. Miles is staring directly at his hands, not wavering at all. “I needed some emotional backup for this, and I guess I thought the students would be sympathetic.”

Jon’s throat is dry. It’s cheesy, but painfully sweet, and nobody’s ever done anything like this for him before. Of course he likes Miles too. “Yeah,” he croaks.

“Yeah,” Miles echoes. “So, uh, if you could answer that question there…”

Jon shakes his head before he can help it. “That was my answer.”

Miles glances at him sidelong, scared and hopeful all at once. “Your answer was yeah? That’s it?”

“What more do you want from me? I’m not a writer.”

“I’d say I want a poster with the answer, but you’d spend an hour just picking the right font.”

Jon rolls his eyes, opens a blank text message on his phone, and types out _Yes_. “There’s your poster, are you happy?”

Miles laughs, all of the nerves vanishing at once. “Over the fucking moon, actually.”

“Good.” Jon slips his phone into his pocket and turns to face Miles fully. “You know, I don’t make lasagna for just anyone.”

Miles shifts on the couch so he’s looking at Jon, bringing them closer together in the process. “Is that so?”

“Mm-hmm.” Jon reaches up and rests a hand on the back of Miles’s neck. “I guess that makes you special or something.”

Miles grins. “I always knew you liked me,” he says. He’s still grinning when Jon kisses him.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on [Tumblr!](http://officialseancassidy.tumblr.com) And check out Tam's excellent prequel fic linked in the works-inspired below!!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [To say we've got much hope](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5276432) by [marquis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marquis/pseuds/marquis)




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